


Small Projects

by GCLane



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Canon Compliant, Coming Out, Knitting, M/M, but definitely fluff, lightly angsty fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-26
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:07:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21565045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GCLane/pseuds/GCLane
Summary: Knitting is systematic fidgeting. It’s colors and textures and patterns. The goal is making something beautiful to put on your body or someone else’s. OfcourseDavid learns how.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 174
Kudos: 1001





	Small Projects

**Author's Note:**

> CW: This fic breaks the "no homophobia in Schitt's Creek" rule with a brief allusion to a homophobic slur. Beyond that, it's people kissing and knitting. I promise.

The apothecary’s door rings as it opens, and, at once, David is in love. 

Not like that. Well, not with this woman walking into their store. And maybe not with him? But also maybe? They’re very new and it’s very overwhelming. David is having a hard time telling if he’s, like, actually in love or if he’s attention-starved. He has been told, more than once by more than one person, that he does things because he’s attention-starved. But how would anyone else know his motivations if he himself barely - 

“Good morning,” she says. 

She has green eyes that go with her chestnut hair that go with heathered goldenrod wrap with chunky wood buttons that go with the Breton tee that go with the dark navy skinny jeans that go with the excellent, beat-up, red-laced combat boots she is wearing. She looks so good in their store. David wants to put her in the front window. 

“Hi,” his smile is probably too big, too much. 

“My name is Carolyn Morin - call me Caro - I own a yarn company about 50 miles from here. We’re called Canada Bluegrass.” 

“I’m David Rose.” They shake hands. “How can I help you, Caro?”

“I’d like to discuss selling our products in your store.”

“Clothing?”

She pops the fasteners on the lid of a big plastic tub. “No, yarn.” 

David looks inside, “Oh. We sell a number of hand-knit items…”

“I know,” she nods and smiles, “But yarn crafts are very popular and we have something special. Here,” she tosses a mass of deep red yarn at him. It’s not a ball - it’s twisted around itself, like a challah. The yarn weighs nearly nothing and is pleasing and rough against his palm. “We use an uncommon spinning technique. It makes light, warm yarn that blocks out beautifully. We get our fiber from farms in a 150 mile radius and spin and dye everything onsite.”

David squishes the yarn in his hand and nods. Carolyn leans in a little. Conspiratorially, she says, “Smell it.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Trust me.”

David puts his face against the yarn and breathes. He smells buttery, musty grass. He looks up at her. “Oh wow!” 

“I know. It’s how we process the yarn. Leaves more of the lanolin in.” 

He has his face back in the yarn. “That is… that _is_ something special.” He tips the plastic tub toward himself. There’s a rainbow of yarn inside. “Where do you get your dye?”

“All naturally-derived, but we don’t get it locally. There’s no one doing a broad enough range of colors.” David nods. “So I’m going to leave you with that,” she indicates the yarn in David’s hand, “And my card, and some sample bands I’ve done with your logo and mine.” She slides a slate-gray folder across the counter. “Let me know what you think.”

“I will,” David enthuses and shakes her warm, small, dry hand. “Did you make your wrap?”

“My wife did. We both knit.”

“It’s gorgeous.”

“Thank you.”

*

David has the yarn unwound on the counter and is carefully considering a single, strategic snip with a pair of scissors and the support of a Google search for “how to make a ball of yarn,” when Patrick comes back from lunch, carrying two coffees. 

“Hi.”

“Hi,” Patrick kisses him on the cheek and sets his drink on the counter. “Where did you get yarn?”

“A beautiful lesbian named Caro gave it to me. She wants us to sell it.” David’s attention is divided between Patrick and a YouTube video of someone dropping a skein - the yarn challah is called a skein, it seems - over the back of a chair to wind it. “Smell it.”

“What?”

“Smell it. It smells amazing.” 

Patrick leans into the counter and gives a sniff. “Wow.” He does it again. “What did she put in this?” 

“She said it’s what they don’t take out. More lanolin.” 

“My mom’s yarn smells like the fake flowers at the craft store.” 

While David carries a chair out of the back room and starts winding the yarn first around his fingers and then around itself, Patrick looks through the folder that Caro left. “This is impressive. And expensive.”

“Fits right in, don’t you think?”

Patrick drops a kiss on David’s shoulder. “I think so. The branding model is different from what we usually do, but you should give her a call. We can draw up an agreement and try it out for a couple of months.” Patrick closes the folder and smiles at him. “While it’s cold outside and with the holidays coming.”

*

Good business owners do market research. 

David can see his breath in the sunset as he crosses the street near Town Hall. 

He remembers seeing Jocelyn knitting at the cafe once, having an animated discussion with Ronnie, not looking at her hands. It was impressive. 

“Hi. I have a question for you?”

“Sure thing, David! What’s up?” She’s tucking her Jazzagals folder in a shoulder bag. Her big, bright, teacher vibe is always affecting, though rarely in a good way. Today, he feels bashful, as if the success of this new partnership rises and falls on her approval.

He fishes the yarn out of a Rose Apothecary bag and hands it to her. “You knit, right? Would you buy this at $20 for 200 yards?.”

“That’s pretty pricey,” she chuckles, tossing the ball a couple of inches off her palm. “It’s light.” Of her own volition, she brings it to her nose, “Mmm,” she hums. 

“Right?”

Jocelyn squeezes the ball as she hands it back. “I wouldn’t make a blanket or sweater, probably - that would be too expensive. But a project with a skein or two? A hat or some mittens? I’d consider it..” 

“Got it. Thank you.” David tucks the ball of yarn back in his bag, bites his lip, and blurts, “Do you have knitting needles that I could borrow?”

“Do you know how to knit?” She asks, her voice so cheerful it makes David squirm internally. 

“I do not.” 

Jocelyn beams and pats him on the upper arm. “Come with me.”

He’s in her living room for nearly two hours drinking strong, sweet, milky tea and fumbling with a pair of bamboo needles. Jocelyn teaches him to do a long-tail cast-on with some “practice yarn” that’s nothing like the crunchy, delicious stuff that Caro gave him. She teaches him how to make a knit stitch and explains the difference between garter and stockinette. 

At one point, not long before he leaves, Jocelyn sits on the coffee table in front of David. She takes his arm in her hands, turning his forearm to show him his own sweater. “See? This part is stockinette and the cuffs are a two-by-two rib. This is machine-knit, of course, but it’s all the same idea.” She drags her index finger down a single chain of knit stitches in the cuff. David can see it, can understand how the sweater he paid $800 for was made. 

“Huh.” 

*

At just past six and dark as midnight, Patrick drives them to Brebner’s for baked ziti supplies. David spreads his fingers on two of the car’s heat vents. In the glow of the sodium-lit parking lot, he shows Patrick the five rows of stitches he has completed with Caro’s yarn. “That’s really neat,” Patrick enthuses, squeezing David’s knee. 

David leans on the handle of the shopping cart in the dairy aisle, phone out, explaining yarn to Stevie at some length. Patrick considers his ricotta options. He adds his choice to the shopping cart and drops a kiss on David’s head.

David’s hum of acknowledgement is obscured by whispers and laughter at the other end of the aisle, by the frozen pizzas. There are three teenage boys there, watching Patrick and David while pretending not to. Patrick consults his grocery list with the same level of over-attention that the boys are giving the freezer case. 

Even still, in their muttering, Patrick hears a word that he’s heard a hundred times before, but never applied to him. The small, casual viciousness of it runs him through. Being harassed for his sexual orientation - it’s quite a milestone, though not one he expected to be experiencing near the part-skim mozzarella. 

David doesn’t look up, but he does say, “Don’t,” quietly to Patrick. 

”Of course not. I’m just getting eggs. They’re over there.” David bobs his head in a nod, keeps texting. 

Patrick walks toward the boys and they hurry away. He does actually need the eggs - that wasn’t a lie - but he is definitely taking this walk to make them flee. 

One of the boys is slight, blond, and slow to follow his friends around the corner into the cereal aisle. Patrick checks a carton for broken eggs, not looking at the boy. It’s alarming how ready at hand all of his middle and high school defensiveness is, how desperately he wants this non-threat of a child who he outweighs by 50 pounds and 15 years to just go away. 

The boy is a blue puffer coat and a pair of bright white sneakers in the corner of Patrick’s eye. When he turns, he steals a glance at the boy’s face, and, oh, this isn’t meant to be a follow-up on the slur thrown his and David’s way. 

Patrick tips his chin, “Hey.”

“Hi,” the boy replies. He rocks forward on his toes, like he’s about to speak again, his hands coming up, his face a little crumpled, contrite. 

“It’s alright,” Patrick blurts, accepting the unspoken apology, fending off whatever is rushing up behind the child’s palpable anxiety. He wants to tell him about the rewards to be gained from doing the work to go from being a miserable kid in a puffer coat, going along with his foolish friends, to a man - well, yes, in a puffer coat - but with a boyfriend who makes him feel alive and brand-new.

The boy’s expression relaxes. “Okay,” he nods. He glances around and grabs a box of pizza rolls from the freezer. “Uh, see you,” he turns and trots away. 

David pushes the cart toward him. Patrick sets the eggs inside and David steps him back against the freezer case, kissing him. The aisle is empty, except for them, but David keeps it quick, sweet. “I saw that,” David nods, caressing his cheek. “I saw all of that.”

*

Knitting is systematic fidgeting. It’s colors and textures and patterns. The goal is making something beautiful to put on your body or someone else’s. Of _course_ David learns how. 

He knows that, when he was a different person, he would have had a biting remark for this. He never would have bothered to even try. Something inside aches like grieving when he gets too close to those notions, so he darts around them in his mind.

Rather than think, he knits the 200 yards that Caro gave him into a long rectangle, alternating six rows of knit and six rows of purl (which he taught himself watching YouTube videos). He cast on sixty stitches and, at first, he re-counts after every row, making sure he didn’t drop any. He’s quietly pleased every time the number is still sixty. 

Jocelyn put him on this path, so her approval, God help him, continues to matter. She stops by the store for hand cream and he hurries to the back to get the tote bag that contains his project.

“That’s great, David! Are you working from a pattern?” He must have a blank expression that’s meaningful to a teacher, because she continues, “People write knitting patterns that you can follow. Like a recipe.”

“Oh! No - I’m just making this up,” he can’t tell if he should be proud of that or if he’s doing something incorrect.

“Well, it looks really good, but you can always look online for patterns, if you’re interested in making something specific. Ravelry’s great.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s a social media platform for knitters. It has an amazing pattern library.”

David’s control over the volume and pitch of the big, resonant voice he inherited from his mother slips, “There is social media for this?” he accuses, clutching his project.

Someone should have taught him so much earlier. 

*

“So David’s… reliable, then?” Patrick’s mother asks carefully. 

“Mom,” Patrick switches the phone from one ear to the other, five blocks from work. 

_When I get to the next corner, I will have said it,_ he promises himself. 

“I’m allowed to worry! I Googled him and -”

“Oh, mom - don’t do that. That was - that was all a long time ago. He’s not like that. A lot has happened.” He crosses the street, curses internally. 

_I am not allowed to pass the fire hydrant without saying it._

“If you’re sure.”

“I am completely sure. He’s been nothing but responsible and thoughtful, mom. Really,” Patrick says, walking past the fire hydrant, not saying _which are characteristics a mother should hope for in her son’s first… thing that we are._ “I have an entire bachelor’s degree in this stuff,” he insists over his own thoughts, “I know what I’m doing.” _I have no idea what I’m doing. The way he looks at me sometimes! Touches me! I had no idea! None!_ “Things are going really well - I promise. We’re on track to turn a profit over the holiday season, which is partially David’s doing.” Patrick pauses, then blurts, “You should just talk to him sometime. You’ll see.” 

_Does that count? That does not count._

“I tried to find him on Facebook,” she explains. 

“Yeah, he’s not… on there,” _you don’t know how to use Instagram, do you? Please don’t know how to use Instagram. Oh god, that picture of us on Instagram! He did put that in his story, right?_ “Just call the store sometime.” 

“He’s very handsome,” his mother giggles and Patrick stumbles over a nonexistent, uneven patch of sidewalk. _He’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen._ “I’m sorry, but a woman notices!” 

“Mom,” is all he can manage. The announcement is choking him, but it won’t come.

“Okay, okay. I’ll let you go. You open at ten, don’t you?”

“We do.”

“I’ll call the store. I want to meet this person.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too, sweetheart. Thank you for calling me.”

He’s half a block away, and, as he ends the call with his mother - _a failure another failure I’m gay it’s two words how fucking hard_ \- he can hear bass thumping in the store. Those little bluetooth speakers David asked him to mount on the walls have a lot more bump than one would expect. 

It’s 9:50. Patrick pauses at the locked door before digging out his keys. David is sitting on the counter, three feet of knitted fabric trailing off the customer-facing side, absolutely blasting Jay-Z, head-bobbing, fluid, mouthing the words, watching his own hands. He’s wearing black pants, a skirt, and a white buttoned shirt covered in black flowers. His rings are bright in the sunshine and he just looks so… contained. At home. Comfortable. Perfect. Enviable. 

The windows are frosted at the edges with the cold, but Patrick’s view is clear. He takes a picture without being noticed. What if he just sent it to his mother? Would she just know - would she be able to see how Patrick sees David? Would that be enough?

That’s not saying it, either. 

He owes it to his parents and to David to locate the nerve to give them, himself, a word. A name. 

He lets himself inside. 

He kisses David hello and turns the music down. From the back room, he calls, “My mom wants to talk to you.”

“Oh?”

“She wants to make sure you’re not a malingerer who’s taking advantage of my business acumen.” 

“Damn - I was hoping I could keep this up for at least a year before anyone caught on. Really milk it for all it’s worth.” David’s smile is sly and he’s hopping off the counter. “I would love to talk with your mother. Perhaps she can share strategies for getting you to stop leaving wet towels on the bathroom floor.”

Patrick leans in the doorway, heart hammering. “Well, she never broke me of it, so.”

“I refuse to accept my fate. I’ll unlock the door?”

“Yep!”

*

David asks for two more skeins of the red yarn and Caro sends them in the mail. He uses almost all of it extending the rectangle until it is a scarf. He looks around on Ravelry, finds another video on YouTube, and learns that he needs a tapestry needle. Jocelyn gives him one (“They come in a package of two - keep it!”), another cup of tea, and her approval of the video-maker’s mattress-stitch technique.

It takes three attempts and a lot of swearing, but he sews one end of the scarf to the other. David fills the tub in the love room with four inches of cool water and a squirt of no-rinse cleanser and drops in the scarf in. 

Wet, it bleeds on the bright white motel towel when he presses it. “Ugh, sorry, Stevie,” he tells the empty room, while spreading more towels on the floor and manipulating the scarf into shape.

After two days of checking on it, the scarf is dry. He puts it on, sits on the bed, and looks up. Soaking didn’t ruin how good the yarn smells. The red brings out the brown of his eyes. He takes a picture of his reflection, studies it, sighs, and takes off the scarf. He smooths it on the bed and takes more pictures, before folding it into quarters, depositing the towels on the back of the toilet tank in the bathroom, and locking the door behind himself.

Alexis is in their room, studying. 

“It’s getting cold out and you don’t dress correctly for the weather,” David says, handing her the scarf. 

“Is this the thing you’ve been making?”

“It is.”

“You were making it for me?”

“No, I was just making it. But now it’s for you.”

She wraps it twice around her neck. “Thank you, David,” Alexis says, and it’s too sincere. They separate quickly, her back to her book, him to the front office to make jokes about destroying the towels. 

*

“I would have gotten into this line of work much earlier had I known it would come with weekend getaways,” Patrick says, following David from their car to the farmhouse. 

Establishing a partnership with Caro and her wife, Michele, had evolved from contracts and routing numbers to texted pictures of sheep and scarves and an offer to come see the spinnery and spend the night. 

They’re welcomed into the front room by Caro, who is in jeans, a cardigan, and a t-shirt that says “smash the patriarchy” in cheery script. A cat immediately wraps itself around David’s leg, as is the custom of every cat in every house David has ever visited, possibly in his entire life. 

“Michele’s in the kitchen,” Caro explains, followed by a yelled “hi! The chicken needs me! Sorry!” from that direction. 

On the couch, two women, one tall and lean, the other short and round, both with mid-length curly hair (one red, one black) and hand-knit sweaters sit with their legs tangled. They’re holding half-empty wine glasses and paused in their conversation with smiles for introductions.

“This is Frances and Clare,” Caro says, pointing at the redhead, then the brunette. “This is David and Patrick,” she says, reversing the hair-color order.

“Hi,” everyone chimes.

Caro leads David and Patrick to the guest room to set their overnight bags down.The cat, of course, follows, nearly knocking David down the stairs. As he recovers, Caro says, “Frances and Clare own a farm down the road a way. They were our first wool suppliers.” 

Patrick sets his overnight bag on the bed and pulls two bottles of wine out of it. “It looks like you’ve already got something open, but -” He hands one to Caro. 

“-but it would be rude not to open this, too,” she smiles. 

Over roast chicken, mashed potatoes, and Brussels sprouts on the candlelit table, David asks Frances and Clare how long they’ve owned the farm. 

“Three years,” Frances answers while Clare chews and nods. “We were in Guelph, working at the university. We were pretty seriously burned out - all of the therapy in the world wasn’t going to fix that mess. We needed a change.”

“It almost wasn’t a choice, by the time we were putting an offer on the farm. It was either that or, I don’t know, implode,” Clare explains, fork halfway between her plate and her mouth, “It felt so much easier to transition once I had some space.” 

“I did that,” Patrick blurts, the shock of recognition overriding his manners. “I mean - kind of. I mean, I’m sure it’s very different - different experiences - but I didn’t feel like I could - um, come out - didn’t even know that I had to, really - until I moved here.” David rests his hand on Patrick’s thigh while Patrick breathes through the burn in his cheeks.

“You’re new, too,” Clare assesses, looking at him closely. She raises her glass across the table to Patrick. “To getting free, right?.” He taps his glass against hers, flustered and grateful that she understood what he was trying to say. 

They eat quietly for a moment, before David says, “Are sheep friendly? Can you, uh, pet them?” The women look confused by his question, so he elaborates, “I was just wondering because you said you were under a lot of stress? And I thought maybe they had therapeutic properties.” 

Frances laughs, “You can pet some of them, yeah! But some will just knock your ass over if you try.”

“How can you tell which are which?”

“Try to pet them,” Clare cackles. 

“No thank you,” David says quietly, shaking his head, still resting a hand on Patrick’s thigh. 

After pie, ice cream, bourbon, and goodnights, Patrick and David return to their room. The bed where they left their bags has a white duvet and a knit afghan. There are two mismatched chairs tucked into opposite corners, a dresser whose finish doesn’t match the headboard, and an adjoining bathroom with a shower with shiny new fixtures and tile. 

David flops onto the bed between their bags. “Oh my god, country queers. I lived too long without farm-owning lesbians in my life.” 

Patrick sits on the edge of one of the chairs, playing with his own fingers. “Yeah,” he laughs quietly but in a way that makes David lift his head from the bedding. “About halfway through dinner I realized that was the most, uh, queer people I’ve ever been in a room with.” He pauses and laughs that non-laugh again. “I don’t even feel like I’m allowed to say that word.” 

David sits up. “That is your word, if you want it to be.”

“I don’t feel - I don’t feel queer. I mean, I know people might call me that, or say that I am… like as an insult or as a compliment.” 

“Well, fuck those imaginary people,” David insists. “Queer is beautiful.” 

“It even feels weird to say that I came out. Like that’s something that’s supposed to happen to someone else - in a movie or a book. I’m just, you know, me, and I met you and it was necessary because -” Patrick stops, unsure what he’s about to say next, not trusting his own mouth or mind. He recovers, “I’m sorry - you’re not my therapist. I don’t mean to put this all on you.” 

David thinks of crowded clubs and Pride parades and the bi/pan group that he went to sometimes at the LA LGBT Center that Alexis was sworn to secrecy about (“Omg, David, do you talk about your _feelings_?”). He thinks of the years it took to be fine with how different he is. “As a prominent member of the local queer community, I am glad to be here to support the newly arrived,” he loads his voice with gentle, teasing grandiosity. 

It has the unintended effect, though, of making Patrick tear up. “I’m worried that I’m going to make a mistake,” he tells the ceiling. “Like say something wrong - I don’t know if I’ve ever talked to a transgender person before tonight and I said way too much, made too many assumptions,” David starts to offer a reassurance, but Patrick continues, “I’m just so… so angry that I’ve wasted so much time not knowing. I’m all backwards and wrong.” 

David slips from the bed and drops to his knees in front of Patrick. “You are not backwards or wrong. You are doing great. And I don’t think Clare was bothered at all.” David takes Patrick’s hands. 

“I just wish I’d known earlier.” Patrick sniffs. “I’m happier than I’ve ever been, David.” 

“I am so glad.”

“And not just about you - though it’s definitely about you. Knowing makes everything so much better.” David nods and kisses Patrick’s knuckles. 

Patrick reaches down and cups the back of David’s skull, leaning in for a kiss. “Thank you,” he insists. 

“You keep saying that.”

“I keep feeling grateful.” 

They stay there, David on the floor and Patrick in the chair, kissing until David begins to worry that he’s going to get a cramp. 

“Let’s get ready for bed. It’s cold in here,” David suggests, his kisses deeper and loaded with intent. 

“Should we be doing… that, here?”

“I am nearly certain that they know we’re going to share the bed, Patrick,” David rolls his eyes. 

“No, I meant - I thought you wanted, um,” Patrick stammers. 

David leans in close, widens his eyes, and drops his voice, “What did you think I wanted?” Patrick gives him a withering look but no reply, so David presses the freezing tip of his index finger to the freezing tip of Patrick’s nose. “You’re so adorable I just want to die sometimes.” 

“Adorable?”

“So adorable.” 

They rarely have a whole night of a closed door and a shared bed. In the dark, after the blankets warm up, David slips beneath them and kisses Patrick out of his pajamas. He follows the trail of his raised t-shirt hem up his belly, across his chest, to his neck. 

David kisses his thighs, high up on the insides, Patrick shivering with shyness. The sweetness of it thrills David every time. “Let’s try something different. Nothing too exciting,” David whispers against Patrick’s mouth. He can feel Patrick’s heart kick against his ribs, but he nods and kisses David. 

“Get a towel and meet me here. We are not going to mess up these nice ladies’ sheets.” 

“Okay. Okay.” Patrick breathes. 

While Patrick is in the bathroom, David digs through his overnight bag. They meet back in the middle of the bed and David gives Patrick sloppy, lingering kisses until they’re both panting. “I want you to fuck my thighs.” 

“You do?”

“Mmm-hmm,” David nods. “You fuck my thighs and we’ll both jerk me off.”

“Oh god, yes,” Patrick moans and kisses David.

David turns his back to Patrick, smears lube high on the insides of his thighs. He reaches behind himself and strokes the excess onto Patrick, who gasps and clutches David’s tricep. David clutches Patrick’s hip and pulls him closer, Patrick’s breath hot on his neck.

Patrick fumbles a little at first but then finds his rhythm, fingers digging into David’s hip and humming softly against his hair. David can feel the shift, like a switch being flipped, when Patrick forgets his manners and gets a little selfish. Still, even as he’s taking David, he whispers, “Like this? Is this good?”

“Oh, honey, yes,” David sighs, stroking himself. 

“I forgot,” He lets go of David’s hip and takes hold of David’s cock. “Move your hand,” he gasps. “Let me.” 

“Such a gentleman,” David chuckles and reaches back to hold the back of Patrick’s head. Patrick bends his head forward to make it easier and lightly sets his teeth to David’s trapezius. Patrick finds the connection between the rhythm of fucking David and stroking him. David cries out. 

“Shhh,” Patrick insists unsteadily in his ear. 

“I can’t help myself, you’re so good at this.” 

“Don’t flatter me,” Patrick chides. 

“I’m not. You are. So good.” David arches his back, lets his head drop to give Patrick more of his neck. He has enough focus to weigh his next statement, but decides to try it. “Not tonight, but sometime? I want you to put your cock in my ass.” Now it’s Patrick’s turn to be too loud and David’s turn to shush. “You’ll be so good at it. Fuck me so hard and make me come. Won’t you?” Patrick nods against his neck, his breath ragged. “Would you want me on my back or on my knees?”

“Oh my god, both. I don’t know. I’ve never -” 

“We can do both. We can let you figure out what you like,” David has been ignoring the build of his orgasm in favor of Patrick, but it’s getting harder to disregard. Patrick’s cock is thick and insistent between his legs; his hand hot and generous. David gets a little lost imagining letting Patrick spread him and take him, so his focus isn’t fully there when Patrick whispers, “Do just like being fucked?”

David latches on to the implication behind the question. “Do you want me to fuck you, Patrick?” Patrick hums an affirmation. “I would love to fuck you. Take my time, put my cock in you so slow until you’re begging me for it.”

“Please, David, please,” Patrick obliges. 

“Shh, I will. I’ll take care of you. You’ll be so wet and ready for me - I’ll make sure.” 

“I’m going to come,” Patrick gasps, warns, promises. 

“What’s getting you there? What you’re doing to me? Or begging me to fuck you?”

“All of it,” he lets go of David’s cock and grabs his hip again, driving deep between his thighs. “I love this. It’s so,” the adjective is lost to Patrick’s orgasm, his forehead pressed against the back of David’s head, David’s thighs slicker and hotter. 

Patrick is soft and relaxed, his hand wrapped around David’s on his cock, the rhythm steady, his kisses hot and open on David’s neck, near his ear, as they bring David off. “I meant every word,” he insists as David writhes under his touch. “Not gonna lie, it makes me nervous, but you like me nervous, don’t you, David?” David nods and luxuriates in the imbalance when one person has orgasmed while the other hasn’t. “I’ve never done that with anyone. Bet you like that, too.” Patrick reaches between David’s thighs and slicks his hand with his own come. “I like it. I want it, I want you.” 

Patrick tightens his slippery hand, sucks David’s ear, and that does it. David comes with a shudder in Patrick’s arms.

After a minute of silence, face half in the pillow, David mumbles, “It would be a shame not to use that shower. Subway tiles - very trendy.”

There’s sheep’s milk body wash and lavender soap and plenty of room for two under the large shower head. David washes Patricks hair while Patrick kisses his neck. 

“I am obligated to say that dirty talk can just stay dirty talk, no matter what,” David says, rising the conditioner out of Patrick’s hair. 

“I know. But I don’t think I was just talking.” 

“We’ll figure it out. You’ll tell me,” David kisses his forehead. “Consent isn’t a one-time thing.” 

“I know.”

“I have to say it. I don’t how much straight-guy, toxic-culture deprogramming we have before us.”

“Oh, years,” Patrick kisses behind David’s ear, “And years.” 

*

By November, there’s a display of knitting needles and yarn in the store. Canada Bluegrass for Rose Apothecary: perfect for handmade holiday gifts for friends, family, or that special someone. 

A limited-edition shade has pride of place in the display - it’s black and white self-striping and, naturally, called “David.” Excellent for socks, hats, mittens, or scarves.

There’s a knitting circle, too, on the second Sunday afternoon of the month, every chair in the store pulled into a circle by the bath salts. In November, four people come. In December, it’s six. They all bring whatever they’re working on and at least one person bakes something. Twyla brings coffee and a tote bag of mugs from the cafe and teaches David how to do simple cables. 

The first day of winter hasn’t come, but that doesn’t matter to the weather. At 5:10, it’s totally dark. Patrick plugs in the extra strings of fairy lights in the windows as he locks up behind Twyla, the last knitting circle member to leave, lugging the samovar back to the cafe. 

David and Patrick have wine in their mugs now. Patrick puts Bon Iver on the little speakers with the big thump and settles into the empty chair next to David with his laptop. He plans to take care of some bookkeeping while David knits. They don’t want to go home yet. Either that, or this is more home than anywhere else right now.

Eventually, after realizing he needs to roll his shoulders back for the tenth time, Patrick slides to the floor and rests against the side of David’s chair, the back of his head against David’s warm thigh, drinking wine, and reviewing inventory spreadsheets. 

Patrick hears the snap of a camera and looks over his shoulder. David smiles at him past the store’s phone. 

“What was that?”

“Marcy says hi.” 

“Did you send that to her?” Patrick tries for casual, tipping his head back to look more fully at David.

“Mmm-hmm.” David glances at the phone before putting it back in his lap and picking up his needles again. “She says red wine always makes you flush like that and you should have some water.” 

It’s not the wine alone making his face burn. He wants to grab for the phone, to see what might be evident to his mother, but he’s too afraid of where that ends, of what he would have to confess into this perfect, quiet evening. Instead, he redirects, tapping the ribbed edge of the work on David’s needles.

“Is that for me?” 

“Maybe,” David wobbles his head and bites back a smirk. He lowers his work again and runs his thumb over Patrick’s bottom lip. “Is that for me?” he wonders with an appealing edge to his voice. 

Patrick answers by dropping his head fully back into David’s lap, meeting his wine-flavored kiss with enthusiasm. The phone vibrates once against the back of Patrick’s head. 

_Later. Later._


End file.
